Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Our host is unavoidably detained for the rest of this week, so he has asked me to do a post for him. About Cornwall. What do I know about Cornwall? Not a lot. I've been there only twice.

I do know that it is considered one of the six Celtic nations as shown on this map. It has its own language, related more to Welsh and Breton than to the other Celtic languages.

The north coast is wild and exposed but with some wonderful beaches which attract tourists. Tintagel Castle is there, the legendary birthplace of King Arthur. The south coast is more sheltered.

Porthcurno beach from Wikipedia.

The Eden Project, gardens and the world's largest greenhouse, is another valuable tourist destination built in a disused clay pit. I've been there and it is amazing.

The Eden Project from Wikipedia

They eat a lot of Cornish pasties in Cornwall, but nobody seems able to agree on the true and authentic recipe.

A Cornish pasty, from Wikipedia.

Finally , they have Land's End, the western-most tip of England. It's rather a shame that it's become something of a theme park, or it was when I saw it a few years ago. It ought to be wild, remote and windswept.

I'm afraid that's pretty much the sum total of what I know about Cornwall. I feel sure Sage and Soubriquet will be able to add and embellish.

Cornwall to me... Memories of long summer holidays spent based around a little cottage owned by one of my father's friends, It was by the water at Sea-Mills, close to where Little Petherick creek meets the Camel estuary. (http://tinyurl.com/seamills)And of course, one way or another, most of the summer was spent in or on the water... Or retrieving the outboard from the glutinous black mud of the creek when the tide was out. 'tis a good thing the old seagull outboards were almost indestructible.One summer, in the year I left school, I was there for five whole weeks, with a friend from home... Two teenagers with a sailboat, surfboards, and enough money to buy beer. Need I say more. Epic.oh. and sunburn. plenty of that.So, Cornwegians, I confess to being a sometime grockle, and occasional emmett. But hey, we loved you, despite the occasionally surly way you took our money...I particularly liked old pubs in little less-than-villages, where old men with accordions sang songs of cape-horn, Cloudy, very alcoholic cider, and stormy headlands. The moonscape of china-clay workings near St Austell.Brother-in-law-to-be was at R.A.F.St Mawgan, getting to grips with Nimrod long range maritime reconnaissance aircraft, when he was not chasing my sister.I've not been to Cornwall for a long time. It's nearer now, roads are faster, straighter, which I'm not sure is a good thing. I liked the feeling of an arduous journey to open my holiday.

Soubriquet, they sound like very Swallows and Amazons type holidays, albeit in the wrong part of the country. I remember the stories of people driving to Cornwall for the summer, pre-motorway, and it taking something like 11 hours. Those were the days!

Grumpus, Daphne du Maurier of course. I read her autobiography not so very long ago - interesting! She didn't come out of it in a shining light. Because I'd read Rebecca in the past, I thought I'd give some of her others a try, but it wasn't a great success. Very dated.